Monday, October 5, 2009

I am working on a personal challenge this quarter (in addition to my Star Consultant goal), which involves booking 5 appointments each week of the quarter.

I will go to the Fluevog store and put these shoes on layaway. Each week I do my 5 by Friday, I will put $20 toward my shoes. This means that in 10 weeks I will have my shoes paid off. It just so happens, that there are approximately 10 weeks left in the quarter!

And nice new red shoes for the holiday season!!! I'll be putting a picture of these shoes on my MK board to help motivate me, and in the meantime I'm spreading the word because when you tell people your goals, they become more real and seem easier to reach.

My question for you is: is there a goal you need to set? A prize you want to reward yourself with? Go for it! Share your goal and get to work!

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Looks like McDonald's will now be serving patrons at La Louvre. Some art lovers consider this a "sign of the apocalypse", but I disagree. I think McDonald's belongs at La Louvre. An installation piece that, more than anything else represents the culture of today. A "McCulture" if you will. In the tradition of Andy Warhol, McDonald's has taken something great and unique, mass-produced it and made it available to everyone with 99 cents in their pocket. Warhol did this and died a very rich man.

Allow me to break down my theory here.

Pop art was what some might call a "travesty". It elevated something as banal as a soup can to the level of the Mona Lisa and people ate it up. Warhol's cynical genius created a movement that is still going today. He used the skills that he had (marketing) to make people want his work and want him. There's nothing special or interesting about an 8 minute film of a man sleeping. There's nothing original or thought provoking about off-color reproductions of images of Marilyn Monroe. Unless you view it as a commentary on the comodification of our culture.

Now, if you believe as I do, that the purpose of art is to create something that shifts the view of your audience to be more sympathetic to your perspective by showing them exactly what you see, McDonald's is one of the greatest art franchises of the 20th century. McDonald's has created a real-life performance piece about the comodification of our culture. Not only that, in being so ubiquitous within our culture it has created a "McCulture", changing our slang. Kids meals are Happy Meals. Burgers are Big Macs. A teenager's very first job (often in food service, often at McDonald's) is a "mcjob". Giant houses that go up in a matter of weeks are "mcmansions". In a sense, McDonald's has continued the work of Andy Warhol, (and Marcel Duchamp before him), in making an art out of making chumps of everyone around them.

It's impressive and hilarious, but as I've already said, very little exemplifies contemporary culture more than McDonald's. As such, I believe it belongs at La Louvre. Centuries from now, art history students will look back at our culture and, just as we look back at the Renaissance and only see Michaelangelo and Titian; they will see Warhol and McDonald's. They won't know that we didn't think of McDonald's as art, much the same as people of the 17th and 18th centuries didn't really think of the contents of their cathedrals as art. That's not the point. Michaelangelo changed the way the world viewed itself. So did Warhol.

There is a lot that goes into this blog, most of it is me. You may read some things that challenge you or your assumptions about the way the world is or should be. Feel free to peek thru, but bear in mind that what you're reading is basically the inside of my head.

In the last year, I've dealt with an eating disorder (and other health issues in my own body), the illness and death of my father (from pancreatic cancer), happiness and excitement at forming new relationships and building existing ones, and the death of my daughter (Timelord). So much has happened, but all I can do is live my best life and that's what I'm going to do, even while I grieve.

The persons you read about in this blog are real. They have lives and feelings, and I want to respect their privacy as much as possible. And while it is entirely possible that you know who I'm talking about, everybody has a codename. It's a thing.

One last thing, all this stuff is for my own personal edification. I do hope you enjoy it and find wisdom here, but I also don't care if you don't like it. :D